


A Woman's Part

by mistrali



Category: Little Women Series - Louisa May Alcott
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:02:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24252535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistrali/pseuds/mistrali
Summary: Jo wonders why men get to have all the adventures.
Kudos: 6





	A Woman's Part

**Author's Note:**

> There is a bit of ambiguity, for a variety of reasons, in Alcott's presentation of Jo's gender. I have tried to replicate some of that in this fic. This was intended as a reply to a prompt about genderfluid or trans Jo, but it never quite got that far.

Today Jo’s restlessness _would_ persist, despite long walks. Under Hannah’s astonished guidance (“I never saw the like!”) the hearth had been given a vigorous raking, the family’s boots scrubbed until they gleamed, the floors swept, all the bedrooms dusted, and the kitchen cleaned to within an inch of its life.

When even Marmee went out, declaring she had a headache from all the housework, Jo curled up in her attic and consoled herself yet again with chestnuts, letters and _Twelfth Night_.

She had thought it would cheer her up, but today, in her lovelorn state and with a sort of wistfulness that seemed entirely in harmony with the lowering clouds, she found herself in tears. How she wished she was Viola in truth, able to dress in the breeches and shirts which her scapegrace Laurie held so dear, and then change back again to dresses and petticoats. She had always felt like ‘one of the fellows’, but college was a dream for her, and manhood an even larger castle in the air. Yet Viola had gone back contentedly to Orsino in the end, shedding boyhood forever and becoming, as Father was so fond of saying, ‘a little woman’. 

* * *

“Has genius taken a holiday, Jo?” asked Marmee, peering into the study. The cap lay neglected on the floor.

Jo shook her head in irritation. “Oh, Marmee. I set out to write serious, ladylike, society stories, and all I can think of are capers,” she said disconsolately, throwing her latest effort, ‘Tom the Gunslinger’, down with a thud. “I wish I could turn into a boy all at once, and then it wouldn’t be so hard to grow up. It seems that men have all the adventures. Friedrich – I- I mean Mr Bhaer - said my stories were no better’n poison, and he was right.”

Marmee smiled. “You always were my boy, Jo. Your stories will do you good for now; they will keep your mind occupied and your pen inked. But too much of such things is not nourishing for young minds, girls or boys’. Maybe you’re in need of some adventure yourself,” she said, inspecting Jo’s ‘rubbish’ with a critical eye.

“I couldn’t,” said Jo, throwing her arms around her mother. “Not with Beth so ill, and when I’ve just been to New York. And you look so tired, Marmee, that you deserve a vacation yourself. I’ll take you and Bethy to the seaside again.”

For there were new wrinkles around Marmee’s eyes, and her smile lacked something of the optimism it had had in springs past.

Jo decided there and then that they would have a gay vacation, and both Marmee and Beth would return from the seaside suntanned and vital. 


End file.
